Here is a brief overview of some of the most popular JavaScript Application Frameworks for web and desktop application development. Mobile frameworks, like Sencha Touch, jQTouch, jQuery Mobile and PhoneGap, have been purposefully omitted for sake of clarity.
Built with jQuery
JavaScriptMVC “is an open-source framework containing the best ideas in jQuery development. It guides you to successfully completed projects by promoting best practices, maintainability, and convention over configuration.”
Jamal “is a set of conventions and small javascript libraries to achieve a complete separation of HTML, CSS and JavaScript in your web application. Jamal is built on jQuery and inspired by MVC frameworks like Ruby on Rails, CakePHP and their derivatives.”
Claypool “is a small, fast, “railable” Javascript Application Framework, built on jQuery that provides all the usual important patterns for large, long-lived client-side apps, server-side apps, or something strangely, beautifully in the middle.”
CorMVC “is a jQuery-powered Model-View-Controller (MVC) framework that can aide in the development of single-page jQuery applications. CorMVC stands for: Client-Only-Required Model-View-Controller, and is a laboratory experiment in application architecture held completely separate from server-side technologies.”
Built with MooTools
PureMVC “is a lightweight framework for creating applications based upon the classic Model, View and Controller concept. The PureMVC JavaScript port has been completely rewritten by Justin Wilaby and is now based upon the MooTools core for simulation of classes.”
Built with Custom or Proprietary Libraries
Ext JS promises to help you “develop pixel-perfect, cross-platform web apps with ease. Whether you’re a single developer or a development team, the Ext JS component model keeps your code well structured so even the largest applications can be easily maintained. And other developers’ components plug-in seamlessly. Best of all, Ext JS provides an encyclopedic-collection of user interface widgets with a elegant starting theme.”
Cappuccino “is an open source application framework for developing applications that look and feel like the desktop software users are familiar with. Cappuccino is built on top of standard web technologies like JavaScript, and it implements most of the familiar APIs from GNUstep and Apple’s Cocoa frameworks. When you program in Cappuccino, you don’t need to concern yourself with the complexities of traditional web technologies like HTML, CSS, or even the DOM. The unpleasantries of building complex cross browser applications are abstracted away for you.”
SproutCore “is an HTML5 application framework for building responsive, desktop-caliber apps in any modern web browser, without plugins. SproutCore works by doing the only thing that can truly eliminate the latency problem: it moves your business logic to the client. SproutCore applications are full-fledged programs, written in JavaScript. That JavaScript executes in your user’s browser, freeing up your servers (and server engineers) to focus on what’s most important in a cloud application: delivering users’ data as quickly and reliably as possible.”
backbone.js “supplies structure to JavaScript-heavy applications by providing models key-value binding and custom events, collections with a rich API of enumerable functions, views with declarative event handling, and connects it all to your existing application over a RESTful JSON interface.”
Coherent is a web UI framework which ultimately became the code that formed the foundation of Apple’s Dashcode Javascript library. Now with some much needed bug fixes and improvements and re-released as Coherent.
ActiveJS “is a JavaScript application framework that provides local and REST based data modeling and pure DOM view construction with back button and history support.”
TrimJunction “is a conventions-over-configuration, synchronizing web MVC framework for JavaScript. TrimPath Junction is a clone or port of the terrific Ruby on Rails web MVC framework into JavaScript. It is also sometimes referred to as TrimJunction, or as just Junction.”
